An Unwelcome Encounter
by MarieKavanagh
Summary: On the day of her husband's funeral, Walburga Black has an unfortunate encounter with an unexpected guest.


The thirteenth of February 1979 was a bitingly cold day. The cold, yet bright winter sun remained firmly beyond reach behind thick, murky clouds, leaving the graveyard below looking suitably dark and sombre. The bare trees remained respectfully silent, unable to so much as offer a comforting rustle in the icy wind with their barren branches.

Below their naked, arching canopy, a sombre, snake-like procession of witches and wizards proceeded slithered down the gravel path deep into the graveyard, each respectfully clad in rich, black robes of heavy velvet to shield the winter air.

The graveyard, one of the biggest and oldest in London, was shared by wizards and Muggles alike, not that the latter had neither an inkling of nor consent to the fact. Deep at the far end of the graveyard, too far from the reach of the Muggle car park for many to bother to stray, lay a large swatch of land shrouded in undetectable shield charms masking it from the view of all things non-magical. Not even the common pigeon would peck the grass here, though a bowtruckle might be found at the bottom of a tree if one were to look carefully on a good day.

It was to here that the funeral procession of Orion Black proceeded, to lay to rest the patriarch and Heir Apparent of the Black dynasty.

At the very front of the procession, one step behind her husband's magnificent levitating coffin, walked his wife, Walburga. She wore a heavy, fur-trimmed black cloak, a veiled hat and a blank expression. At her right stood her son, Regulus, looking far too pale and tired to have been out in the frigid weather. And to her left stood (hunched, rather) Arcturus Black, father of the deceased and appearing downright furious to have outlived his only son and heir.

Along the gravel path they trudged, the wintery air sending a billowing chill every so often, until they reached the wrought iron gates of the secluded section of the wizarding graveyard containing the most extravagant plots; family plots, almost all of them adorned with towering stone monuments bedecked with coats of arms, as opposed to simple lettered headstones, and almost all of them owned by members of the Sacred 28 Pureblood families.

The procession halted at the centre of the graveyard and its attendants gathered around the dark grey monument marking the site of the Black family tomb. Six feet tall and deemed grim-looking even at the time of it's building several hundred years ago, it's front face bore a carving of the Black family coat of arms, surrounded by the family motto, "Toujours Pur". Though the tombstone itself was at last beginning to resist it's preserving charms and threatening to show it's age, the intricate carving and words remained as sharp as the day they were chiselled, proudly declaring the presence of the remains of what the Blacks themselves considered to be wizarding royalty, such was the purity of their bloodline.

Surrounded by her immediate and extended family, flanked by her son and father-in-law, Walburga Black stared almost unseeingly through the black lace of her veil as her husband of a quarter-century was ceremoniously interred to his final resting place alongside their ancestors, as she herself one day would, and her son after her, and his sons after him, fate-willing.

And yet, here and now, Walburga's mind couldn't help but wonder about the Black that would not join his relations in the tomb. The one who should have led the procession today as his grandfather's newly-proclaimed Heir Apparent in his father's untimely absence.

Perhaps it was inappropriate, she considered to herself, to think of the disgraceful shame of her firstborn son at such a sombre time. But it was rather hard not to think of him when he stood mere feet away from her at his father's graveside.

The signs were so subtle that few, if anyone, would have noticed it. But Walburga's keen senses had proven a valuable asset to her over the years, and she was never without them on full alert, particularly on a day such as today. The Black family's enemies were many, particularly during these troubled times, and at first Walburga had wondered if the footsteps detectable by the pressed-down blades of grass on the dew-damp lawn surrounding the path to the tomb belonged to some shielded invader intent on causing mayhem and misery of some description. But as she watched the slight twitching of the gravel stones as the invader tiptoed across to join the procession, the owner of the minuscule crunching footstep noises placing himself boldly at the very front of the group beside Regulus, Walburga's more private suspicions were confirmed. Only one would be so bold as to sneak undetected into a private funeral and stand among the chief mourners of the deceased.

The deceased's firstborn son.

Walburga busied herself with pondering the ways in which her errant son could have achieved this remarkable feat of invisibility. A powerful glamour or disillusion charm, perhaps? Some new potion she had yet to come across? The thought distracted her from the dismal service at hand, as the wizard reciting her husband's eulogy drawled out his greatest qualities and achievements, not that they were of any great significance to anyone not in receipt of a chunk of gold from the Black coffers. Eyeing the invisible figure with her head remaining fixed forward so as not to arouse suspicion, Walburga waited on edge, her wand gripped firmly inside the folds of her heavy cloak in case their unknown guest decided to make a regrettable move. It would be just like him to risk sneaking into a sacred ceremony simply to cause a scene. But to her somewhat surprise he remained still beside his brother.

Oblivious to his brother's presence, Regulus stood slightly hunched over, practically swamped in his mourning robes and heavy cloak, and let out a quiet sniff which may or may not have been an effect on the bitter cold numbing his nose. Walburga didn't expect him to notice that a hidden figure stood mere inches from his side. Walburga's second son had never been the keenest eye for detecting suspicious activity, but today he was less alert than usual. Understandable, given the emotion of the day combined with the fact that he had barely slept in the week he'd been home from school on compassionate leave. He'd tried to deny the lack of sleep to his mother but the dark circles under his eyes and sound of anxious pacing coming from his room in the middle of the night spoke for themselves. Walburga blamed the stress of his upcoming NEWTs.

At long last, the service was concluded. One by one, the attendants gathered to offer condolences to Walburga, Arcturus and Regulus before taking their leave of the cemetery, each of them no doubt relieved to be free of the dreary cold and chilly atmosphere at last. Walburga nodded and thanked the politely, as was expected, all the while keeping one eye fixed on the ever-so-slight groove trodden into the gravel stones by the tomb that gave away her son's presence.

When at last only the three immediate family members remained, Walburga squeezed Regulus's shoulder in as reassuring a gesture as she was prepared to offer in public.

"Regulus, take your grandfather home. And for Merlin's sake, get some sleep. You look ready to drop where you stand"

"I'm not done in yet, Walburga, I can take myself home" Arcturus snapped, swishing his three-decades-too-old mourning cloak closer around his shoulders, sharply brushing aside his grandson's attempt to link arms for Apparation.

Sighing, Walburga watched her father-in-law Disapparate with a loud crack before turning back to her son.

"Home, now" she repeated her order to her son, her voice soft.

With a silent nod and another sniff, Regulus cast his bleary eyes one last time to the direction of the tomb where his father now lay before following Arcturus back to Grimmauld Place with an identical crack.

Alone in the graveyard at last, Walburga drank in a deep breath of the icy February air, almost sighing with relief after the stifling atmosphere of the funeral service.

Refreshed once more, she glanced once more at the spot where her hidden son stood beside the family tomb, no doubt waiting for his mother to take her leave so he could freely move at last. He of all people understood her sharp eye for hidden magic. He wouldn't dare move a muscle while she remained.

Walburga tugged the fur trim of her cloak tighter around her shoulders as she turned gracefully and strode back towards the tomb, pacing directly behind where she knew her eldest son to be standing.

"Don't think I haven't known you've been here this whole time" she said, her voice low, her tone cold. "Come, walk with me"

Without a backwards glance to see if her son followed, Walburga began to stroll down the cemetery path, out through the wrought iron gates segregating the family plots and along the path cut through the neat rows of common headstones. Silently she walked, the click of her heels on the stone path the only noise penetrating the silence. She could have been alone, she could have been followed. In all honesty, she wasn't entirely sure either way. But just in case she did have a walking companion, she didn't dare turn her head to confirm it, lest she give an impression of uncertainly.

"It was brave of you to come here today" Walburga spoke at last after several minutes. "Foolish, yes. But brave, nonetheless"

Silence.

"I suppose you thought yourself bold coming here" Walburga continued, wondering lightly if she was indeed talking to herself. The first sign of madness, they say. "I suppose that was all part of the appeal to you, the thought that you could be caught. The laughable idea that you could be apprehended for having the nerve to attend your own father's funeral too good to resist"

The trees would have been a lovely shield from the summer sunshine, Walburga pondered to herself, inspecting the mighty branches hanging overhead. Their plumage would certainly be picturesque, if the structure were anything to go by.

"I wonder if perhaps you wanted to pay your respects. Say a last goodbye, as it were. Find closure"

Walburga supposed the flowerbeds looked a lot less dreary in spring. Someone could have at least bothered to dig up the wilted corpses of last season's blooms.

"Or perhaps you simply wanted to make sure he was really dead"

She bit out the last sentence, fighting to keep the anger that thoughts of her eldest son had a habit of igniting at bay. This wasn't the place for hysterics.

"I suppose you don't know how it happened" Walburga continued lightly.

She could have had a friend in arm beside her, for all she was chattering away.

"You wouldn't know, of course, how he died. It was all well-hushed. Even I didn't know until after Christmas. The family until mid-January"

Walburga remembered clear as day the bitter row over a matter now so obviously petty, two days before New Years' Eve, less than two months previously, when her husband had nearly keeled over there and then from a coughing fit, the grotesque hacking noises that drew the purple bile from his throat. Dragon Fever, the Healers confirmed. A nasty and quick-acting illness. No cure. Two more professional and expensive yet pointless second opinions at her own insistence confirmed the diagnosis.

But of all people to be shocked by the fatal prognosis, Orion Black was the least affected. He had known for months, he later confirmed to his wife and son, that his end drew near. But never one to make a fuss, he had carried on, hiding the symptoms, stifling the coughs, whilst he tidied his affairs.

"He never did know what was good for him" Walburga said with a light huff and shake of her head.

She was aware that she was approaching the boundaries of the magical wall separating the wizarding cemetery from it's Muggle counterpart. The wizarding cemetery was shamefully smaller than the larger Muggle plot, she mused. She had many more words to speak, and just not enough path to speak them to. Besides, perhaps the flower beds would be better kept. Unlikely, of course, but who knows?

"Your father always did work too hard" Walburga mused. "Never did put his health first. In fairness to him, there was quite a lot to organise. An estate as large and wealthy as ours is not an easy one to untangle from the control of one person" She swallowed firmly, squashing the lump threatening to rise in her throat. "But then, you'd have understood that if you'd cared to remain in your place long enough for your father to teach you the running of the estate"

Silence, still. Always silence.

Walburga wondered if she was simply speaking the thoughts that had remained locked inside of her for the past three years, or if she was attempting to rile up a response from the boy who could rarely stand to be even slightly criticised without flying into a rage of defiance.

"It was exhausting work, you might care to know" Walburga's voice quietened. "It's no easy feat, breaking the enchantments that entail an estate to the eldest son of the bloodline. And even more so to force them to bond to a new line. I lost track of how many nights your father sat up, locked in his study, attempting to track down and piece together the exact course of magic required"

She gripped her wand tightly for support under her cloak as images of her increasingly stressed and tired husband flashed through her memory.

"I suppose it never occurred to you the burden you would place on your father by choosing to shirk your responsibilities towards this family" she seethed bitterly, aware of the anger flooding into her voice with every word she spoke to everyone and no one around her. "But then you never did stop to consider anyone's feelings besides your own. I suppose it never did occur to you that it would be down to us to clear up the mess created by your vanishing into thin air in the middle of the night, skulking off to the shameful company of blood traitors"

The world around Walburga remained curiously silent.

Perhaps her son had finally learned some self-control, perhaps even a degree of self-criticism. But then again, perhaps he simply wasn't here.

"It was all sorted, eventually" she explained to whomever might possibly be listening. "It took the better part of a year but the entail was finally broken. Regulus will inherit, naturally, when he finishes school. My brother will preside over the estate until then"

She paused for a moment, considering the facts of which her son was probably still unaware.

"I mean your uncle Cygnus, that is" she informed him, possibly. "You needn't consider yourself with Alphard anymore. He forfeited the right to bear the name Black when he supported your atrocious actions"

Again, the cemetery remained remarkably silent for the place in which Walburga's eldest son had just heard himself insulted yet again.

"I'm sure that's when it all started, you know" Walburga was at this point incapable of preventing her feelings from cascading out of her in a waterfall of words. "Handing control of the estate over to his wife's brother... It was nothing more than a shameful admission to the world of his failure to produce a faithful firstborn son to take over. The shame of it all is what kick-started the illness, I'm sure of it"

She crunched her heels deeper into the ground, the paving stones below her feet the unwilling victims of her frustrations towards her eldest son.

She glanced around at her surroundings for the first time in several minutes, noticing that she had wandered deep into the Muggle cemetery. The flowerbeds were as shamefully dreary on this side of the boundary as they were in the Wizarding section.

However one object of interest caught her eye. And conveniently, it was right along her current path.

"He was never the same after you left, you know" Walburga murmured. "Who would be, with their eldest son and heir having abandoned them and all they hold dear?"

On closer inspection, the approaching object ahead appeared to be a great stone monument of some sort, not unlike the Black family tombstone, though much bigger, and the stone a bright sandy colour rather than sombre grey. It distracted her momentarily from the memory currently flashing through her head, of her husband hunched over the open spell book on his desk, his face pale and drawn, in search of the spell that would finally provide their errant son with his greatest wish to be formally sliced out of the Black inheritance.

Even after all he had done, how deeply he had betrayed them, their son had still ultimately gotten what he wanted out of his parents. But what choice had he left them?

Perhaps then, there would be peace. Reaching the great stone monument at last, Walburga suddenly felt the urge to stop. To pause. The relief of lightening herself of the burden that was her heavy thoughts had proven surprisingly taxing, and the need to rest momentarily overtook her.

She turned and faced the monument, noticing the slightly shabby wreaths of red-and-black flowers placed at the foot of the monument, several of them blown askew in the wintery breeze.

"You broke his heart, you know" Walburga spoke quietly, the stifled fury that had been threatening to resonate in her voice momentarily quashed by thoughts of the meaning behind the curious Muggle monument. "You broke your father's heart when you abandoned him. I suppose it's fitting that you're here today after all, to see the outcome of your actions"

"You've tried to blame a hell of a lot on me over the years, Mother. But Dragon Fever? That's a new one"

Walburga finally gave in to the overwhelming urge to turn her head in search of her son. Lo and behold, she was rewarded. Appearing as if from thin air, Sirius Black revealed himself to his mother at last, tugging the large, shimmering cloak which hid him from over his head. He smoothed his long black hair, replacing the ruffled strands tugged astray by the large, shimmering cloak being tugged over his head.

"Where on Earth did you get one of those?" Walburga asked, her voice light and casual, presenting the illusion that any of this could be considered normal.

"From James" Sirius said, matching her almost cheerful tone as he neatly folded the Invisibility Cloak his best friend had loaned him for the occasion, draping it over the crook of his arm and shoving his hands deep into the pockets of his formal, black robes. His mother directed her gaze down towards her son's arm which had been partially vanished by the silky material resting over it, in an effort to avoid meeting the steel-grey eyes that matched her own.

Walburga couldn't help but raise her eyebrows in surprise at the sight of her son's clothes. No doubt he hand't intended anyone at the funeral to have known he was there, but he had still bothered to dress correctly for the occasion nevertheless.

"The Potter boy?" she asked, the name dripping off of her tongue like a drop of bitter slime. "The blood traitor"

"My best friend, yes" Sirius replied icily, half-glancing across at his mother every few moments before returning his gaze to the Muggle monument before them.

"Rare and expensive objects, Invisibility Cloaks" Walburga remarked. "Exceedingly expensive, in fact"

"And your point is?"

"A little out of the price range of the son of an upstart potioneer. A moderately successful one, I concede, but nevertheless-"

Sirius cut his mother off with a sarcastic snort and tossed his hair out of his eyes.

"I thought it was unseemly to discuss the finances of other people's families?" he asked, emphasising his words with his haughty accent, a mockery of the very world in which he'd been raised.

"The finances of respectable families, yes" Walburga clarified calmly, resisting the bait her son was so clearly offering. "Those of traitorous bloodlines, however-"

"Oh don't start with your blood purity ranting, for heaven's sake" Sirius cut her off sharply, any illusion of pleasantries evaporating instantly. "I can't stomach it today. And lay off James's family. They were good to me"

"They should never have allowed you to stay" Walburga couldn't stop herself from snapping back. "They should have refused you. They should have insisted you return to us, not supported your foolish ways. What sort of parents support such ridiculous, selfish actions?"

"The sort that know a family of bigots when they see one" Sirius snapped back, stamping the toe of his shoe hard into the stone path in frustration, scuffing the leather. "I was happier with James's family than I had been in a lifetime of living with yours"

"My family?" Walburga repeated, the audacity of her son's words ringing through her head. "And precisely when did my family cease to be your own?"

"The day you drove me out"

"I did no such thing"

"Memory escaping you in your old age is it? Because I definitely remember your exact words that day, even if you don't"

In truth Walburga remembered precisely every moment from that faithful day nearly three years ago. The day her son turned his back on his family, his future and the values his parents had tried so hard to instil in him his whole life.

She remembered with painful clarity the argument over the breakfast table, the morning Sirius had staggered into the dining room following the slam of the front door as he entered the house, dressed in the most horrendous Muggle rags his mother had ever seen, his face bearing an almost ill-looking expression and reeking of stale alcohol. A simple "Where have you been?" from Orion was all it took for him to detail the various Muggle establishments he had spent the night in.

'Nightclubs', he called them.

The name brought nightmarish images of vulgarity into Walburga's mind.

She remembered how she had screamed at her son, how she had ranted and raved about the shame he brought on the Black name, the name he was proving less and less worthy of bearing each day. Sirius had been remarkably unresponsive, content to simply sit slouched in his chair with a defiant smirk plastered over his half-asleep face, barely raising an argument to her words, which grew more inflammatory the less he fought back.

In painful hindsight she had realised it was all part of his technique. Years of shouting matches between mother and son had taught him how to wind his mother up to the point of releasing the worst of her insults towards him, leaving him an opportune chance to step back from his own attack and instead switch to the role of wronged martyr.

And this skill became the winning hand of her son's cruel game.

Having driven the declarations out of his mother that he was a disgrace to the name of Black, unworthy of his inheritance and that she could no longer stand the sight of him, that night Sirius kindly relieved his family of the burden of ever having to see him again.

So silent were his footsteps through the house in the dead of night that neither his parents nor brother realised he was gone until they felt the chilly morning breeze filling the hallway that morning, from the front door left carelessly swung open.

"If you remember that day so clearly, then you must also remember what an absolute state you were in" Walburga spoke quietly through the little puffs of steam produced by her breath in the icy air. "Exactly how long did you expect us to put up with your disgraceful behaviour? Every night, out running amok among Muggles and Salazar knows what other filth, wallowing in your own selfish behaviour, blissfully unaware of the damage you were wreaking on not only your own name, but the family's as well"

Walburga suddenly realised she had allowed her voice to creep slightly higher than the expected volume for a solemn place. Ever here, in the realm of Muggles, appearances mattered. She quickly confirmed their solitude with a darting glance of her eyes. The tiny glint in she recognised in her son's eyes as he spotted an opportunity for a fight quickly faded as she lowered her inflammatory tone.

"You didn't have to listen to the talk among the other families" she seethed through gritted teeth. "The comments your father had to endure when people began to hear about what an embarrassment you were becoming. The shame he had to endure. It ruined him. You ruined him!"

Emotion choked the last sentence out of her throat. Walburga couldn't help but raise her voice as she felt the weight of the day's events press down on her, the enormity of her loss hitting her like a smack in the face sharper than the gusts of Arctic wind stinging her cheeks.

Sirius dug the toe of his shoe harder into the ground. The leather would be truly ruined if he wasn't careful.

"I'm not going to stand here and let you tell me how any of this is my fault, because it isn't" he replied, remarkably calmly. Maturity appeared to have granted him a degree of self control at last. "Yes, I left. I ran away, I abandoned the family, however you want to spell it out. But you left me with no choice. I couldn't stand it anymore. Listening to your constant squawking about what a disappointment I was"

"Don't you dare turn this solemn day into an attempt to satisfy your own selfish need for sympathy!" Walburga snapped, her fiercely cold eyes glistening with what appeared to be dangerously close to the appearance of tears. "That's all you've ever done. Howled about your own miserable needs rather than put your selfishness aside for the greater good!"

Sirius's grey eyes flared for anger.

"The greater good?!" he repeated sharply. "And tell me, Mother, what exactly is the greater good, in your opinion?"

Walburga cringed inwardly at her son's patronising tone of the word 'mother'.

"The good of the family, of course!" she fired back angrily, three years of emotions flowing freely at last. "The good of the cause, of the wizarding world, not that you've ever shown the slightest bit of duty towards protecting pure wizard blood. You're perfectly content to be out fraternising with all sorts... mudbloods, half-breeds and Merlin only knows what else, while decent, noble wizards fight for all of us. I'm only glad Regulus-"

"You stand there-"

Walburga was struck by how dangerously quiet Sirius's voice had become as he took a slow step towards her. He practically growled his words, hackles raised, his body tensed as if ready to pounce.

"-and talk to me about fighting for the survival of the wizarding world. You dare to look at me and tell that I'm the one condoning the spill of magical blood, while up and down the country witches and wizards are dropping like flies at the hands of that murderer Voldemort-"

"Do not speak his name!" Walburga spat threateningly, her voice crackling with fiery sparks.

"I'll speak his name if I damn well want to" Sirius fired back, ignoring the angry twitch at the side of his mother's mouth at his crude language. "That "Dark Lord" of yours, as you insist on calling him, is nothing more than a murderer. And good witches and wizards are dying every single day trying to stop him. If anyone is bringing the wizarding world to ruin, it's him and that idiotic, ignorant group of followers of his"

Walburga turned to face the great stone memorial before her once more, her eyes fixated on the letters carved in the stone, their gold paint flickering in the dull, winter sunset. She drew a deep lungful of crisp, cold air into her chest, the shock of it returning her to her senses.

"You were always so convinced of your opinions" she said, her voice quiet and controlled once more. "Even when you were a child, you never would listen to reason. Always so blind to the thought that you could ever possibly be wrong"

"Oh believe me, Mother, I've been wrong plenty of times, but this isn't one of them" Sirius said back, his own voice temporarily composed once more. "But I don't expect you to bother to try and understand that. You never did even bother to try and understand my point of view, or anyone else's for that matter. Your way or the highway, right?"

Walburga sniffed indignantly at the common, Muggle phrase, the wisps of sharp, February air stinging her nose.

"You think I don't lay any blame on myself for how you turned out?" she asked. "Well not for the first time today, you are mistaken. I do blame myself"

Her stormy gaze still fixed on the anonymous list of names before her, Walburga could practically feel her son's head turn to look at her, a favour she did not return.

"We were always too soft on you, your father and I both" she continued when Sirius did not reply. "We let you get away with far too much when you were a child, never truly taught you to obey. I'm only sorry I realised it too late. We should have nipped it all in the bud years ago; the ridiculous Muggle clothes, the music, letting you take Muggle studies at school, even. That obscene group of half-bloods and blood traitors you ran wild with-"

"Don't talk about them like that" Sirius clenched his teeth at the venomous words his mother used to describe his closest friends.

"They led you astray" Walburga continued relentlessly. "We'd had none of this foolishness before you started school. We should never have put up with them putting you into that house of blood traitors in the first place. I should have put my foot down, insist you be switched to Slytherin the day after the Sorting"

Walburga's son threw back his head and let out an undignified bark of a laugh, a noise most ill-fitting in this sombre of surroundings.

"Don't make me laugh, this really isn't the place" Sirius replied with a grin. "You honestly think a snake instead of a lion on my school uniform was the difference between me staying the perfect little pureblood son you wanted and actually seeing sense and realising how ridiculous this family's values are?"

"We had none of this with Regulus" Walburga retorted pointedly, lifting her gaze a little higher to examine the imposing words bearing down upon the list of names, 'The Glorious Dead'. "Your brother managed to stay on the straight and narrow at school"

"Yeah well, Reggie never could manage to do anything of his own accord, could he?"

Walburga winced at the ridiculous pet name her eldest son insisted on calling his brother. She hated it as much as Regulus himself did.

"Anyway I'm pretty sure the constant letters to him at school reminding him not to follow in my shameful footsteps helped, didn't they?"

Walburga's head snapped round to glare at her son. Why would Regulus share the contents of their private letters with him?

"How do you know what I wrote to him?"

"I didn't" Sirius replied, trying and failing to keep a smirk off of his smug face. "But I do now. You're not quite as unpredictable as you'd like, mother dear. I could see him from all the way over on the Gryffindor table, chewing his bottom lip in that worried little way he does whenever you bark an order at him"

Walburga turned sharply away from her son to resume staring at the Muggle memorial.

"Do you even know what this is?"

"What?" Walburga snapped, her eyes darting sideways for a moment.

"This memorial" Sirius gestured to the stone monument before them. "Do you know what it is?"

He spoke as if they could be any other mother and son enjoying an afternoon stroll, examining an interesting find.

Walburga put her guard up.

"No" she admitted through gritted teeth, eyeing her son suspiciously.

"It's called a Cenotaph" Sirius explained plainly. "It's a war memorial, commemorating the dead of two Muggle World Wars of 1914-1918 and 1939-1945. Two wars in which thousands of soldiers and innocents were slain in the name of what basically boiled down to ignorance and fanaticism. Just think, all those lives, wiped out. All that blood, spilt"

"I assume there's a point to this little history lesson of yours?"

"No, I just thought you might like to hear a little of what we learned in Muggle Studies at school"

Walburga glanced sideways to meet Sirius's joking smile.

Her son still retained enough of his learning from a childhood spent under the Black roof to recognise the glare that told him to stop messing about and get to the point.

"The first war, originally, they called the Great War" Sirius continued. "'The war to end all wars', they all said. Until the next one, of course. But what always gets me is the thought of all those people that were willing to die to ensure that this war would be the last. That they cared so much for the greater good that their own lives didn't matter. A noble way to go, don't you think?"

"Spoken like a true Gryffindor" Walburga sniffed again, blinking away the tears brought about by the gust of icy wind and whipped across her face.

"This is our Great War" Sirius's voice took on a less airy than before, perhaps more solemn than Walburga had ever thought it possible for him to produce. "Up and down the country, good people are laying down their lives to fight a man that would see anyone who isn't a Pureblood destroyed. in an instant. And you support him. You, Dad, Regulus, the whole family. You condone the killing of innocents in the name of some warped idea of blood purity"

Sirius had turned to look at his mother, and Walburga, sensing his movement, turned to meet his cold, accusing stare, completely lacking of any trace of family love.

"You talk of my betrayal to the wizarding world, but I am more loyal to the wizarding world than any of you will ever be. The only thing I'm disloyal to is your precious Black legacy"

"You need not detail your disloyalty to your family to me" said Walburga, her voice muttered to hide the cracks forming in her throat. "I am far too aware of that already"

"If my family supports the death of innocents, then I will be proudly disloyal til the day I die"

A silence hung heavily between them which not even the bitter February chill could penetrate. Mother and son locked gazes, identical grey eyes searching one another's for any trace of familiarity, of understanding, and finding no trace of either, both turned away at the same moment to face the monument once more.

"Maybe one day we'll have a memorial of our own in this cemetery" Sirius remarked after a few moments, his voice light and airy once more. He stared up at the great, white stone, his head tilted slightly to the side as he used to do as a boy whist staring up at his favourite portrait of a sword fight on horseback on the stair landing of Grimmauld Place.

"Just imagine, a list of the names of those that had to die because they had the guts to stand up to a maniac" he continued, seemingly more to himself than his mother, for all his voice trailed off absent-mindedly.

He chuckled slightly.

"I reckon people might be surprised to find a Black on there at first, but it'll give them something to talk about"

"Stop it!"

Walburga whirled round to face her son head-on, her lace veil billowing in the sharp gusts of wind rustling through the trees.

"You talk, all high and mighty, of justice and right, but really this is all just a game to you, as always!" Walburga hurled her words at her son in a tone venomous enough to mask the emotion hidden beneath, constantly threatening to bubble just above the surface.

"Is this the man you've become?" she demanded. "Throwing yourself into the face of danger for the sake of a moment of glory, under the guise of the greater good? Killing yourself for the sake of seeing the Black name on a memorial for Muggle-lovers, in what? Yet another ridiculous attempt to spite your family?"

Sirius was unusual silent. His grey eyes glinted with a defiant shine, but his mother could see it where perhaps no one else would be able to. There, in the corner of his expression. A trace of regret. Perhaps he recognised his poor choice of words. Not that he would ever lower himself to apologise for them.

Walburga let out a cold, choked laugh, her breath sending a puff of steam out into the icy air.

"You stand there, pretending to be all-knowing fountain of wisdom, attempting to talk down to your elders and betters as you always have done, pretending you're some sort of hero, a wannabe-martyr even. You don't fool me, Sirius Black. You never have"

Walburga drank in the sight of her son for the first time, fully, in almost three years. Though he may have now grown to be several inches taller than his mother, to her he may as well have still been the seven year old boy who needed taking down a peg or two for his own good.

She shook her head, somewhat sadly.

"Your arrogance will be your downfall"

"And your ignorance will be yours"

The chilling calmness of her son's words struck Walburga almost as deeply as the look in his eyes. There was not a trace of warmth, of affection, not even of familiarity to be found. Neither was there a hope that any would ever be found within them.

"I believe we are done here" said Walburga, pulling her cloak tighter around her. "I fail to see any useful outcome from the continuation of this conversation"

She turned, slowly, admittedly, away from her son to begin the walk back towards the wizarding section of the cemetery, where she could safely Apparate back to the security and reassurance of Grimmauld Place, and a much-needed stiff brandy.

"Will you pass on a message to Regulus for me?" she heard Sirius call after her. Please"

She would have been tempted to ignore him, if it hadn't been for the hastily added polite courtesy.

She paused and looked back to see her son fixing her with a serious stare, all trace of both joking and anger vanished, replaced only by what appeared to be genuine concern.

"What is it?" Walburga asked.

"Tell him to be more careful in future"

Walburga pursed her lips.

"Whatever do you mean?"

"He'll know what I mean. And so do you, I suspect"

A stiff silence. A whistle of the wind through the trees. Silence again.

"I managed to erase his name from a list of possible sighted Death Eaters last week, before it could fall into Ministry hands" Sirius continued, staring grimly at his mother. "I can't-"

His voice caught in his throat, a momentary lapse of emotion he did well to mask with a cough. "I can't do it again. Tell him that"

Clutching her wand inside her sleeve for dear life, Walburga nodded once, slowly.

And then she turned away and kept walking.

A few moments later, unable to resist, she turned back for one last look at her son, but he was gone, vanished into thin air once more.


End file.
